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Hi Val 
I keep meaning to say this, and I always plan to say it at the end of a post, but by then I always forget, so I'm going to say it right now before I forget again:
Your Artwork is ABsolutley BRIlliant!!!!!!!!!!!
I had a look at all of what you have on your page - the sculptures are Incredible and the photography mesmorising, interesting, emotive and Extremely Impressive!!!
I've been wanting to say that since I first saw them!
Okay, now to answer your last post:
(By the way, if you'd like to use the quote option, copy and paste the text, then select it all, and then, just as you'd click on the B to bold it, click on the little page with writing on it - if you hover above it, it'll say "wrap quote tags around selected text")
I know this experience VERY well - as you will know if you read my post "Rock Bottom" 
Here's what I know, having been through that experience for most of my life, and coming out the other end...
The reason for the apparant cycle of everytime you try to change your life for the positive, you get "crapped on" - or as I put it at the time, every time I get up, I get slapped back down again - is because when you try to change something that's engrained that deeply, the programming causes things to swing the other way to get the balance back to the status quo.
If you try to change a child's bedtime from 10pm to 8pm, he'll kick up a massive fuss. It'll take a few tantrums and dramas - and Unwaverying Consistancy - before he'll accept the new bedtime, and go to bed when you tell him to at 8pm.
You have been programmed to treat yourself a certain way -and that carries across mentally, emotionally, physically, materially and spiritually. And the key point here, is that that programming is UNCONSCIOUS. It's in your cells, so you cannot reason it out, and it doesn't change through only conscious effort. Conscious effort is vital to get the changes started, but it takes Consistancy in Conscious Effort to get those changes in programming to soak through to the subconscious.
When you are dealing with a ROOT Belief - which is the FOUNDATION of your very existance, you're dealing with Survival Beliefs. You have been programed to believe (as contradictory as it sounds to the conscious mind) that your very survival depends on your treating yourself the way you do. The reason this is possible is because the unconscious doesn't reason. It does as it's programed to do. So it doesn't matter that it's illogical to believe that your survival depends on treating yourself badly. If that's that program, that's the belief and that's what your existance is currently based on.
So.... when you try to change a ROOT belief like that, your unconscious mind goes into survival mode and does whatever it takes to regain the status quo. In other words:
* Root Belief = Survival is treating self badly
* Changing Root Belief = Threat to Survival
* Threat to Survival = emergency repsonse to protect Root Belief
* Treating self well = Attempt to Change Root Belief
Therefore
* Treating self well is a threat, and the emergency response to counter it, is to create enough consequence to return to treating self badly, which is the Root Belief and is therefore "safe mode".
I don't know if I've explained that well enough. It makes sense in my head lol, so I hope it makes sense in what I've written.
My sister came up with a great analogy last night (she is the Queen of analogies! ) ...
Imagine a family of deer. This family of deer is disfunctional due to something from generations back. This disfunction results in the belief that they are carnivores. They eat mice and other small rodents. They've adapted their behaviour and survival skills to include hunting small creatures, and they've become good enough at this to survive. They've developed hunting instincts over the generations, and when new deer are born, they're taught to survive by hunting small creatures and eating them.
This generally works despite the fact that they're not the healthiest of deer, and don't live up to their full potential. They don't run as fast as they could, and they often get ill. They're also not happy, but they have no idea why.
Then, one baby deer feels a compulsion to eat grass and leaves. And when she does, she feels blissful. She enjoys it so much she feels like she's in heaven.
Her elders catch her in the act, and react with disgust and anger. "What's wrong with you!! How disgusting!! Grass makes you weak, we don't EVER want to catch you eating grass and leaves again! Eat meat like a REAL deer!!" The baby deer is shamed, she feels like she could crawl under a rock. The other deer in her herd look at her with such contempt. She will never attempt to eat grass or leaves again. Even though it made her so happy while she was eating them - the pain and shame she felt when she was caught are now forever connected to eating grass and leaves.
As she grows, she feels guilt every time she feels that compulsion to eat grass and leaves, and she hates herself for it. There's definitely something seriously wrong with her. Every other deer in her herd take pride in hunting and eating meat, and yet, she secretly longs to graze. A shameful and terrible secret. Eventually she convinces herself that grass and leaves will poison her if she eats them. So she starts to feel ill at the thought of eating them. And yet, despite the fact that she follows the herd, she still feels a core devistating unhappiness. She also feels weak and fragile and ill. In fact, she feels the way she's been told grass and leaves would make her feel. And yet, she's not eating them. There MUST be something wrong with her. What's wrong with her, she's a complete disaster of a deer. Her elders were right, she's disgusting and there's no hope for her. And no matter what she tries, she can't get it right.
And yet,...... from our perspective, we can see quite clearly who was right! How sad there's no-one to tell her.
Treating yourself well and with love and kindness IS the right thing to do, it IS the natural instinct you were born with, but you have been programmed to supress it. That is Tragic. BUT, unlike the little deer in that story, You HAVE been told - by others as well as me - that that is the right instinct, and that the aversion to it that you feel is just the wrong programming. And so You HAVE the choice to go against your parents' programming.
And when it seems that things go wrong when you try to change - that's the defense mechanism of the old programming. You have to just ride that wave, and go "I'm damned if I'm going to give up and go back to the status quo. I WILL keep treating myself well because that is the KEY, and the more things go wrong, the better I'll treat myself!" .... and the over-writing of the programming will begin. But if you keep giving up when the defense mechanism kicks in, you'll keep reverting back to the status quo. And you'll then be choosing to stay where you are, in the status quo.
Think about some of the most successful people in the world. No-one experiences more failure than they do! Richard Branson, for example has had infinitely more failures and had more set-backs than you or I - because he's done more. And the only way to not fail, is to not try. And it is also the way to not succeed. And so, the trying and failing and trying and failing... is all part of the eventually succeeding. It's not a sign of "no point in trying".
Understanding the defense mechanism, hopefully helps you to accept that there will be challenges. But even if those challenges a few months with you pushing through them, determined to consistantly treat yourself well come hell or high water.... surely that's still better than just sitting in the same place you are now.
I don't know if any of this will help. I remember when I was where you are now emotionally and mentally, and I remember that a lot was said to me, and I read a lot.... and much of it didn't penetrate the hopelessness I was living. But something must have. Because, in putting it all together, I began to force myself to relax and I began to force myself to STOP doing what didn't feel good, and I began to Force myself to do things that felt good.... and I went through hell sometimes as my programming fought to the death to hang onto the Root Beliefs of survival..... but I refused to live like that any longer.... and eventually, as the new habits of treating myself with kindness started to take hold, the work that Paths was doing was able to break through, and I was able to start to see results.... and so, my Root Beliefs slowly changed.
And, Val, I can GUARANTEE you, it's WORTH IT!
Hmmmm... I've been told by the forum my post is too long again lol so I'm cutting it here, and will post the rest in the next post....
Love and Light and Magic xxx
I keep meaning to say this, and I always plan to say it at the end of a post, but by then I always forget, so I'm going to say it right now before I forget again:
Your Artwork is ABsolutley BRIlliant!!!!!!!!!!!
I had a look at all of what you have on your page - the sculptures are Incredible and the photography mesmorising, interesting, emotive and Extremely Impressive!!!
I've been wanting to say that since I first saw them!
Okay, now to answer your last post:
(By the way, if you'd like to use the quote option, copy and paste the text, then select it all, and then, just as you'd click on the B to bold it, click on the little page with writing on it - if you hover above it, it'll say "wrap quote tags around selected text")
This has happened many many times. Earlier this summer I declared that I HAD GOTTEN SO HUNGRY I WOULD CRAWL THROUGH CACTUSTO GET FOOD. and I decided to change my life. I determined to try positive thinking, various stuff, and signed up for Paths. Just around then, the IBS pain got worse. And I have had it now for 5 months, half the time of agonizing torture. I became deflated. Why bother being positive when the next bad thing is going to crap all over me? I know you are going to tell me this is a perception, that "bad" stuff happens to us all, and perhaps it is, but I could site many instances in my life where I decided to change my life for the positive, and it was followed DIRECTLY by something bad.......often NOT of my own making, an EXTERNAL event....so I developed the philosophy of laying low, and why bother, and be afraid.
Here's what I know, having been through that experience for most of my life, and coming out the other end...
The reason for the apparant cycle of everytime you try to change your life for the positive, you get "crapped on" - or as I put it at the time, every time I get up, I get slapped back down again - is because when you try to change something that's engrained that deeply, the programming causes things to swing the other way to get the balance back to the status quo.
If you try to change a child's bedtime from 10pm to 8pm, he'll kick up a massive fuss. It'll take a few tantrums and dramas - and Unwaverying Consistancy - before he'll accept the new bedtime, and go to bed when you tell him to at 8pm.
You have been programmed to treat yourself a certain way -and that carries across mentally, emotionally, physically, materially and spiritually. And the key point here, is that that programming is UNCONSCIOUS. It's in your cells, so you cannot reason it out, and it doesn't change through only conscious effort. Conscious effort is vital to get the changes started, but it takes Consistancy in Conscious Effort to get those changes in programming to soak through to the subconscious.
When you are dealing with a ROOT Belief - which is the FOUNDATION of your very existance, you're dealing with Survival Beliefs. You have been programed to believe (as contradictory as it sounds to the conscious mind) that your very survival depends on your treating yourself the way you do. The reason this is possible is because the unconscious doesn't reason. It does as it's programed to do. So it doesn't matter that it's illogical to believe that your survival depends on treating yourself badly. If that's that program, that's the belief and that's what your existance is currently based on.
So.... when you try to change a ROOT belief like that, your unconscious mind goes into survival mode and does whatever it takes to regain the status quo. In other words:
* Root Belief = Survival is treating self badly
* Changing Root Belief = Threat to Survival
* Threat to Survival = emergency repsonse to protect Root Belief
* Treating self well = Attempt to Change Root Belief
Therefore
* Treating self well is a threat, and the emergency response to counter it, is to create enough consequence to return to treating self badly, which is the Root Belief and is therefore "safe mode".
I don't know if I've explained that well enough. It makes sense in my head lol, so I hope it makes sense in what I've written.
My sister came up with a great analogy last night (she is the Queen of analogies!
) ...Imagine a family of deer. This family of deer is disfunctional due to something from generations back. This disfunction results in the belief that they are carnivores. They eat mice and other small rodents. They've adapted their behaviour and survival skills to include hunting small creatures, and they've become good enough at this to survive. They've developed hunting instincts over the generations, and when new deer are born, they're taught to survive by hunting small creatures and eating them.
This generally works despite the fact that they're not the healthiest of deer, and don't live up to their full potential. They don't run as fast as they could, and they often get ill. They're also not happy, but they have no idea why.
Then, one baby deer feels a compulsion to eat grass and leaves. And when she does, she feels blissful. She enjoys it so much she feels like she's in heaven.
Her elders catch her in the act, and react with disgust and anger. "What's wrong with you!! How disgusting!! Grass makes you weak, we don't EVER want to catch you eating grass and leaves again! Eat meat like a REAL deer!!" The baby deer is shamed, she feels like she could crawl under a rock. The other deer in her herd look at her with such contempt. She will never attempt to eat grass or leaves again. Even though it made her so happy while she was eating them - the pain and shame she felt when she was caught are now forever connected to eating grass and leaves.
As she grows, she feels guilt every time she feels that compulsion to eat grass and leaves, and she hates herself for it. There's definitely something seriously wrong with her. Every other deer in her herd take pride in hunting and eating meat, and yet, she secretly longs to graze. A shameful and terrible secret. Eventually she convinces herself that grass and leaves will poison her if she eats them. So she starts to feel ill at the thought of eating them. And yet, despite the fact that she follows the herd, she still feels a core devistating unhappiness. She also feels weak and fragile and ill. In fact, she feels the way she's been told grass and leaves would make her feel. And yet, she's not eating them. There MUST be something wrong with her. What's wrong with her, she's a complete disaster of a deer. Her elders were right, she's disgusting and there's no hope for her. And no matter what she tries, she can't get it right.
And yet,...... from our perspective, we can see quite clearly who was right! How sad there's no-one to tell her.
Treating yourself well and with love and kindness IS the right thing to do, it IS the natural instinct you were born with, but you have been programmed to supress it. That is Tragic. BUT, unlike the little deer in that story, You HAVE been told - by others as well as me - that that is the right instinct, and that the aversion to it that you feel is just the wrong programming. And so You HAVE the choice to go against your parents' programming.
And when it seems that things go wrong when you try to change - that's the defense mechanism of the old programming. You have to just ride that wave, and go "I'm damned if I'm going to give up and go back to the status quo. I WILL keep treating myself well because that is the KEY, and the more things go wrong, the better I'll treat myself!" .... and the over-writing of the programming will begin. But if you keep giving up when the defense mechanism kicks in, you'll keep reverting back to the status quo. And you'll then be choosing to stay where you are, in the status quo.
Think about some of the most successful people in the world. No-one experiences more failure than they do! Richard Branson, for example has had infinitely more failures and had more set-backs than you or I - because he's done more. And the only way to not fail, is to not try. And it is also the way to not succeed.
And so, the trying and failing and trying and failing... is all part of the eventually succeeding. It's not a sign of "no point in trying". Understanding the defense mechanism, hopefully helps you to accept that there will be challenges. But even if those challenges a few months with you pushing through them, determined to consistantly treat yourself well come hell or high water.... surely that's still better than just sitting in the same place you are now.
I don't know if any of this will help. I remember when I was where you are now emotionally and mentally, and I remember that a lot was said to me, and I read a lot.... and much of it didn't penetrate the hopelessness I was living. But something must have. Because, in putting it all together, I began to force myself to relax and I began to force myself to STOP doing what didn't feel good, and I began to Force myself to do things that felt good.... and I went through hell sometimes as my programming fought to the death to hang onto the Root Beliefs of survival..... but I refused to live like that any longer.... and eventually, as the new habits of treating myself with kindness started to take hold, the work that Paths was doing was able to break through, and I was able to start to see results.... and so, my Root Beliefs slowly changed.
And, Val, I can GUARANTEE you, it's WORTH IT!
Hmmmm... I've been told by the forum my post is too long again lol so I'm cutting it here, and will post the rest in the next post....
Love and Light and Magic xxx
. You may not be able to see the connection at the moment, but that doesn't matter, keep playing because it's fun and you enjoy it - and the rest will come Automatically. WELL DONE Val, for what you are doing, and it just takes little steps like that, one at a time, and if you're determined, and you keep going with the little steps, you'll one day look back and realise you've come further than you thought possible - and you'll keep going. 
I don't understand about the building or my cat. Okay, I am repeating myself too much.........I do agree with you about the physical, mental, emotional......but this idea of spiritual is new to me.......I want to change my self esteem, which is why I hope Paths will help.
If by choice or situation you have no blood family, consider adopting one. Become a valued member of a group that is rich in family values. Contribute, selflessly give to the families cause.
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